Economic burden of malaria in six countries of Africa

Abstract

Economic burden studies are important for use in advocating with Ministries of Finance and donors for increased investments in public health problems such as malaria. In September 2001, the authors convened a workshop at which a framework for the assessment of the economic burden of malaria in the African region was presented to health economists from 10 countries of the region. The framework document proposes the use of any one of three approaches – production function, cost of illness and willingness to pay – for the assessment of the burden of malaria to the economies of African countries. Between 2002 and 2005, six countries (Chad, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda) undertook studies to assess the economic burden of malaria using the framework. The objective of this article is to report on the methodology, results and policy implications of the country economic burden studies. Of the six countries whose results are presented in this report, Ghana and Nigeria used all three approaches to estimate the economic burden of malaria. Uganda, Rwanda and Chad implemented the production function and the cost of illness approaches, while Mali used only the cost of illness approach. All countries implementing the cost of illness and willingness to pay approaches that required household surveys employed a multi-stage sampling methodology and used a structured questionnaire as the principal